What's Ahead: The Drake University men's cross
country team will split their squad this weekend to compete in two separate
meets. One group will head east with the women's team to defend last year's
Bradley Classic title. The 8-kilometer race on Friday (Oct. 12), hosted by
Bradley University, will be held at the Newman Golf Course in Peoria, Ill. and
will start at 4:40 p.m.

A select
squad will fly to Louisville to compete against some of the top runners in the
nation at the Pre-National Meet. The men's race will begin at 9:30 a.m. at Tom
Sawyer State Park on Saturday (Oct. 13). Teams were selectively invited to this
seeded race, which will serve as a precursor to the NCAA Division I Cross
Country Championship to be held on the same course on Saturday, November 17.

"Our workouts have been going very well so we're
excited to see where we're at in our final tune up prior to MVC Championships,"
head cross country coach Dan Hostagersaid.
"Our young men and women have been working extremely hard these past weeks and
months and this is the point of the season where it really starts to pay off."

Last Time Out: Junior Brogan Austin(Boone, Iowa) and senior Charlie Lapham(Golden Valley, Minn.) led the charge for the
Bulldogs at the Roy Griak Invitational in Falcon Heights, Minn.

Sophomore Bill Spencer(Kolona, Iowa) finished 93rd
in 27:13 with junior Guy Eckmanright
behind in 94th in a time of 27:17.

A Year Ago: Led by Austin and fellow junior Omet Kak (Des Moines, Iowa) the Drake
men's cross country squad won their fifth team title of the fall season at the
2011 Bradley Classic.

Austin, who
finished the 8-kilometer race at Newman Golf Course in 24:41.7, was the
runner-up to Butler's Ross Clarke. Kak's finish in 25:09.0 earned him a
seventh-place finish in the field of 188 runners from 19 schools.

Drake won
the meet with a team score of 76 points. Second was MVC conference rival
Wichita State with 111 points.

Rounding
out the team scoring for the Bulldogs were senior Colin Hagan in 25:14.16, Charlie Lapham in 25:38.4 and Conor Wells(Des Moines, Iowa)in
25:41.5, who finished in 11th, 27th and 29th respectively.